


Arundari

by merriell



Series: the forest children [4]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Fantasy, Magic, Multi, Urban Fantasy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-08
Updated: 2019-10-17
Packaged: 2020-04-22 23:10:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 20,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19138732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merriell/pseuds/merriell
Summary: 2020. Daniel Haryawijaya, a barely-qualified guard on Magical Creatures Conservation Society's Iceland Conservation, found himself to be the sole witness of a creature heist that cost the conservation one of its prized possession. When he decided to abandon his visiting friends to investigate the heist, though, some troubles arose that forced him to rearrange his priorities...[genre: (urban) fantasy, adventure / book 1 of 3]





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, I decided to translate my own works.
> 
> Go figure.
> 
> Enjoy!

When Daniel Haryawijaya opened his eyes, he was greeted by the whirl of the wind that swayed the branches above his head. The sound that disturbed him was not the whistle of a song from a far-away bird, but the crunch of dry leaves beneath a pair of feet. The first time he did upon opening his eyes was to sniff the air. There was a burnt smell in the middle of the late morning air, bringing him back to his childhood, spent in front of a half-broken television filled with white noise, with the scent of _hio_ that his mother burnt.

The uniform he was wearing felt awkward around him when he moved the position of his feet that was previously hanging in the open air. His eyes gazed at the earth a few feet below him. A transparent butterfly perched silently on a red flower—only to fled as quickly as possible when the bushes behind it was divided by a pair of pale hands.

The girl that came upon view wore the same uniform as him, although it looks cleaner and was not ripped in various places like his. When her clear brown eyes looked straight above, her lips formed a frown at once. “Found you,” she tapped her fingers at the tree stem where Daniel lay upon. The fierce eyes bit, even from the height. “Come down, we’re on guard duty. You can’t just slack off like this.”

“Malai, _manisku_ ,” he started sweetly. His smile rose upon looking his colleague’s expression turned sharper hearing he had responded her words in Indonesian. He raised his foot back to the branch he was sitting at, then proceeded to yawn while he leaned back to the tree. “Let me sleep, the weather’s so good for sleeping…”

“Daniel,” Malai Kadesayurat’s tone of voice might be calm, but Daniel knew that she was filled to the brim with annoyance. A person that was ignorant of manners might spit angrily on the roots of said tree. But, he _knew_ Malai. With her family background and the doctrine of general courtesy after years of slashing of people’s eyes—she was, after all, a woman—all she did was to say the threats that could scare any grown man that was working there: “I’ll report you to Miss Violet.”

“Ooh, scary,” it was, however, not that effective for him. He only closed his eyes.

“Fine.”

He hadn’t even gotten one foot on the dream world when he felt something had bitten his arm. Panicked, he opened his eyes at once. In front of him was a sphere-shaped thing that might have been mistaken as a ceramic eyeball the size of a tennis ball. It had sunk its sharp teeth in the upper part of his arm. He could see the carved symbols in its surface and vaguely remembered that it meant that the golem was used for surveillance—lucky for him; although the uniform he was wearing prevented his skin from breaking, if this had been an offensive golem, he would have found his arm to be missing a chunk of meat.

Daniel forcefully pulled at the golem until it came off his arm, hissing lowly under his breath. When the golem let go of its bite, he sent it flying a few meters away. Seems undisturbed, the creature went back to Malai’s side. She displayed a satisfied smile at the sight.

“Mock me again and I’ll send more to bite you in the ass,” Malai warned from below.

Daniel rolled his eyes before he decided to be the bigger person. He pushed his body until he fell from the branch. His boots kissed the ground with a loud ‘thud!’.

“Have anyone told you that you’re hard to be friends with?” he whined sharply.

“Speak for yourself,” Malai shrugged. The blue golem that had bitten Daniel was now perched in her shoulder, its sharp claws carefully wrapped around the Thailand girl’s shoulder. The creature displayed its glass-shards teeth at Daniel. Daniel threw it a sharp look but took a step away.

As they walked, another golem perched on the girl’s back. Although ready-to-use golem was provided by the supply department in different forms, Malai had her own army of eyeball-shaped golems. She was one of the two people in their workforce that didn’t come from a university focusing on magical biology. Daniel heard that Miss Violet herself recruited her after a little bird told her that Malai had broken the world record of handling sixty golems at once—a record previously owned by a Russian man who spent his days as a hermit at a mountain.

The second person in the Iceland Magical Creatures Conservation that had no prior further education in any magical biology studies was Daniel Haryawijaya himself. He didn’t even have _any_ further education in general. He had spent two years after graduation helping his mother’s catering service. He had zero expectations to continue his education with his family income, until Violet Skarsgard recruited him herself and offered him to work as a Guard while he studies in the Iceland University of Magical Biology. What was different was the reason of recruitment: the reason he was qualified to work there was the fact that Violet Skarsgard has married into his family, courtesy of his artist uncle.

Despite that, their difference did not halt the efforts of Violet to force them into cooperation as the two youngest people in the conservation. Their schedules, from the three days shifts, had two overlapping days. He had no idea the reasons behind that decision. Maybe she did not trust Daniel to be able to work properly without assistance. Maybe he hoped that Malai will be his only friend (considering others had no qualms of being nice to the boy who only had high school level of education).

Unfortunately for him, Malai Kadesayurat had no interest on being his friend.

While they walk, Daniel opened a small packaging of a foot-shaped red candy that cracked slightly because he had laid on it earlier. He put it inside his mouth, tasting the familiar mango taste before he pocketed his two hands inside his pants. He could still the sound of birds from far away when he asked, “You’re not really going to snitch… right?”

“You can barely form a coherent sentence. You’re incompetent. You’re lazier than a sloth. Who wouldn’t snitch on you? I think everybody wants to, with your lack of abilities.”

Daniel cringed.

Even from the first time they met, Daniel could already guess that Malai, that needed to work harder from everybody around them because she was the youngest member in the row of Magical Creatures Conversation Society staffs of all time, and as the female member in the many male members, she would not take after the young Indonesian man that had not even finished his study yet. But of course, he still felt hurt, because although they had known each other for more than a year, Malai still acted like he was a pest.

Although Daniel knew (in very fair spite) that he had more extensive knowledge on magical biology in comparison to this one colleague.

So, rather than continue the argument, he complained in Indonesian: “Orang yang gak cepu.” He snorted loudly when Malai sharply turned to him, looking like she was going to swallow him whole because she did not understand what he was saying. “What? C’mon, let’s go back to work.”

Side by side, they walked to the central office, passing by creatures protected by the conservation in their journey. The walk felt long because they had to take various detours to avoid dangerous creatures as they hadn’t brought any of their equipment. Only when the soil beneath their feet turned into pebbles that the central office of the Icelandic branch of MCCS appeared. The tall white building reminded Daniel of the soft comfortable dorm bed, making him yawn.

They had not passed the fence that divided the central office and the forest area when another golem sat on Malai’s shoulder. Malai halted at once. Daniel stopped his steps in front of her. A Qur—the transparent butterfly that could often be seen in the conservation—perched itself on the goggles Daniel was wearing around his head. He reached to his head, but instead of flying away, the Qur moved to his fingers. Its wings only seemed transparent from faraway. Up close, the Qur’s wings looked more like a pair of light-deflecting crystals, complemented by a honey-like scent.

“There’s a crack in the protective barrier at B Sector, Section 7,” he heard Malai talk in English. Daniel frowned at once, knowing what was to happen next. “We need to fix it to avoid any leaks.”

“ _We_?”

“You,” Malai corrected. “Don’t complain. Remember the last time you decided to sleep around while this happened and the gumihos fled because of you?”

“Gumihos always flee,” Daniel waved his hand in dismissal, sending the Qur away from him. He pulled down his goggles to his eyes. “Our duty is to protect and give the gumihos shelter. Only when they want to. If they flee, that means they no longer see our service as necessary. God, I know you know next to nothing about magical biology, but you at least have to know that gumihos prefer cities to forests…”

His English that once housed a very impeccable Indonesian accent had disappeared after one year of speaking only in it. He now talked with no indication that he had come from Jakarta.

Malai snorted at that. “And the kid that only got in because of nepotism is supposed to be _the_ expert?”

“Fuck you, at least I actually study magical biology.”

“That’s the behavior I expect from a kid that has not even finished university yet.”

“At least I go to an international university that actually has a prominent magical biology faculty and not some any no-name university in Bangkok without any biology specialty.”

“One, I didn’t go to university in Bangkok, I went to one in Chiang Mai… not that you’ll know what it is. You _do_ know there are other cities in Thailand, right? Not to mention, you only got in to college because your aunt bribed the faculty.”

Daniel sighed. Rather than satisfying his partner with a bothered expression, he stepped hard at the ground beneath him, activating the floating enchantment that had been carved at the soles of his boots. The first golem—the blue one that had bitten him—darted away to the direction of the leak and he followed, balancing his speed so he’d stay behind the golem. After more than one year of working here, he had become the expert in avoiding leaves and branches that are ready to hit his head or animals who would not hesitate to swallow him. He could still remember the first few months when he always sleeps with new bruises and bandages every night in various parts of his body.

He tilted the back of his soles to the ground when he saw the navy golem halted. Due to his previous speed, though, his movement only stopped a few meters away from the golem.

If you see it with naked eyes, the forest still went on for miles. But Daniel could see the flash of a reflective light in the middle of open air, signifying the conservation’s magical barrier: transparent walls that divide the outside world with the magical-influenced forest. Daniel pushed one of his foot gently to the ground, automatically turning off the floating enchantment.

As he approached the barrier, he pulled his goggles back to his head. The golem sat in his shoulder as he opened the sling bag that he had been carrying. His hand pulled out a metal box out of it.

Daniel frowned at the cracks in the barrier in front of him—it looked exactly like cracked glasses—and the ground around it. The ground was fairly undisturbed. He could usually tell what kind of creatures had been sniffing around or pushing at the barrier—disturbing the magic due to their natural affinity—from the footprints around it, but he could only see his own footprints in the soft soil alongside of scattered dried leaves, pushed around by the wind that he made when he previously halted.

“Weird,” he muttered, more to himself than to anyone else, although he could tell that Malai could still hear him from the golem.

He opened the box. Inside was a few compartments housing small turquoise spheres. He pulled one out and pressed it into the cracks in front of him. At once, the sphere melted and slowly enclosed itself inside the cracks until the barriers turned back into what seemed like empty air.

He had not even got the time to breathe nor to search for a suitable tree around there to sleep on when the golem that previously sat on his shoulder pressed against the back of his neck, sending shiver down his spine. Daniel hissed and turned sharply, ready to hex that golem until it melts back into clay, but said creature fled quickly until it was a few feet away before floating gently in the air. The ‘irises’—or what was made to resemble the part—was in Daniel’s eye line, making it seemed like it was staring at him.

“What?” he snapped.

Normally, Malai’s golems would have disappeared by now that the job was done. This time, that creature stayed floating in the air near him with his empty clay-made eyes fixed on him.

Daniel felt the sudden churn of anxiety inside his stomach. He turned his gaze away, busying himself in the chore of putting his box back to his bag.

He heard a loud rustling from the bushes behind the golem before he managed to close his bag properly. Nimble as always, he reached for the fire-charm located at the side of his feet only to halt at once. The first thing he saw was a pair of wooden-like antlers poking from between the leaves. Then, the body of a creature that layman could have mistaken as a deer’s. Daniel knew from the lack of irises in the creature’s eyes—the color of curdled milk—and the pale turquoise fur that it was a _dyr_.

The _dyr_ stepped closer. Meanwhile, Malai’s golem landed on top of the creature’s head. With movement as graceful as a swan, she stepped out of the bushes before leaning down to eat the grass beneath her feet.

“...Hey,” Daniel greeted softly. A smile rose in the side of his lips. He’s been working in here for a while and yet this is the first time he had seen a _dyr_ with his own eyes. Being the representative animal in MCCS’s logo made _dyr_ popular, although it only shows his presence once in a blue moon.

She raised her head to Daniel’s direction before returning back to her activity. She sniffed at the grass near her snout before erecting her body back. Then, she walked to the direction of the conservation’s barrier—where the cracks previously were. She took a sniff before licking the surface with her purple-colored tongue.

Daniel’s magical creature education had been extensive, even borderline obsessive at times, supplying him with ready-to-know information about any creature without him even having to try so hard to remember. He knew that the appearance of a _dyr_ meant that a storm was meant to come. They never specified whether it was literal or figurative, but he made a point to check the sky of the conservation before smiling at the amazing creature, asking: “There’s going to be a storm, isn’t it?”

The _dyr_ stopped at once. She turned to Daniel. Her eyes had no irises or pupil, but a warmth pooled on the base of Daniel’s stomach. His instinct told him that she was staring at his face.

Although _dyr_ had a non-humanoid figure, his experience so far made him recall all the _gumihos_ he encountered in his career as a guard. He couldn’t shake the feeling of how human they feel like even when they weren’t glamouring their fox-like body to possess a human body. _Dyr_ , or at least this one, gave him the same feeling.

Daniel raised his hand, tempted to touch the snout of said creature.

_BZZZZZT!_

His hand flinched as that blue golem suddenly darted at his hand. It bared its teeth at him as if threatening him not to touch the _dyr_. The sudden movement sent the Dyr into galloping away from him.

“Son of a bitch...”

_BZZZT! BZZZZT!_

A persistent buzzing could be heard from the mouth of the golem. Daniel took a deep breath before scoffing. “Yes, copy,” he muttered.

Malai’s voice sounds flat and bored coming out of the golem’s open mouth. “You know that _I_ know that the application of portable charms produced by HQ is child’s play and doesn’t even take 20 minutes, right?” Daniel didn’t feel like answering her. He only rolled his eyes knowing that Malai could see it. “Get your ass over here. I need you to check something. It’s an emergency.”

“Little Miss Perfect ‘needs’ me? Could be snowing in Jakarta tomorrow, eh.”

“Don’t talk too much and hurry back here,” Malai commanded sharply.

“You know, why don’t you do your guard duty as once and not sit around in HQ like you have nothing better to do...”

_TING._

Daniel grumbled loudly. Malai had disconnected the connection. Still, out of sheer pettiness and self-satisfaction, he flipped his middle finger at the golem’s direction.


	2. Chapter 2

Done with acting like a high school student, he gestured at his shoulder with his thumb. The golem understood at once. It landed on his shoulder, burrowing its claws into his (luckily) clothes. Daniel stepped at the ground hard to activate the magic in his boots. After he successfully floated in the air, he surfed back to the central office. His body nimbly avoided the trees he passed by while he let his mind wander to reminiscent about the fresh memory of the _dyr_ he encountered.

Upon arriving at the central office, he found Malai standing in the steps of the porch, blowing a gum into a pink balloon that pops obnoxiously when it got too big. Malai raised her gaze when she took wind of Daniel’s steps in the hard soil.

“What’s up?” Daniel asked. The golem on his shoulder moved quickly to Malai’s.

“B-7 isn’t even that far from HQ. How is it that you’re _never_ on schedule?” nagged Malai as she tapped at the transparent tablet on her hand. The blue golem snuggled itself on her neck. “I’ll look over the tapes in Gianna. If I find anything that indicates you’re doing anything off-the-books, I’ll report you to Miss Violet at once.”

“Bacot ah, kontol,” Daniel’s habit to annoy her with Indonesian was back, mostly because he couldn’t be bothered to think of a response to her words, seeing that she was actually right. He had been slacking off these days. The twitch on the corner of Malai’s mouth when she heard the unfamiliar language, though, brought an easy, teasing smile to his. He pulled up the goggles that was previously still covering his eyes, easily turning back to English: “You have no right to protest about my lateness considering you’re always sitting around here and doing no physical work whatsoever.”

“It’s ‘tardiness’.”

“You won’t know, but there’s a lot of dangerous creatures out there. I need to be careful. Safety is number one, no? For me, the safety of my handsome face is number one.” Malai gave him a pitiful scoff. “There’s a lot of stray branches out there...”

“You don’t need to worry,” Malai replied lightly. “You’re not _that_ handsome.”

Daniel chuckled. He could live with insults against his face and his general appearance—it never bothered him as much as getting called ‘ _Cina_ ’ during recess because of teenagers who did not know better.

“Then? What is it that warrant me to hurry?” Daniel fixed the strap of his bag as he asked.

“There are cracks in a few sectors. The distance between the cracks are quite far, but it happened at once.” Daniel leaned in to look at her tablet. He followed her fingers as she showed flashing red dots in the blue border which encased the entirety of the conservation. “This is too measured to be called coincidence. Do we need to ring the alarm? Code blue?”

Daniel thought of the cracks that he fixed previously. “You know, the ground around the cracks I fixed...”

“Yeah?”

“Never mind,” he shook his head. “That barrier’s automatic alarm hasn’t been triggered yet, right? That must mean that the cracks are still small. There’s still possibility of a creature intelligent enough to walk alongside the border area. We need to check manually first before alerting the system—that’s the protocol. If there’s no indication of serious code-blue situation... I don’t want to deal with the sanction if your machine fails. It’s still in trial-mode. It can’t be fully trusted yet.”

“Fair enough.”

Daniel narrowed his eyes at Malai’s direction. There was something off, not only about today, but also about her. It hadn’t been half an hour since his meeting with the MCCS’ star. Then he noticed Malai’s suspicious compliance to his opinion, even glossing over the backhanded insult he punched at the end of his sentence.

He decided not to bring it up. He wanted this kind of attitude from Malai, anyway. “Okay. I’ll check the barrier. If the cracks are there, then it wouldn’t take five minutes to fix each one,” he opened his bag and took out the metal box again, making sure he had enough supplies to fix every crack. He had no intention of going back-and-forth to get supplies from storage.

“Five minutes? Every time you’re tasked to fix anything with those charm you always disappear for a day.”

“Dreamlurer is everywhere in this part of the forest, it makes me sleepy.”

“Sure.” Malai glared at the direction of her tablet. “If that’s the case, then I’m coming. Who knows, you might found a Dreamlurer and be enticed to sleep. You’d need someone to kick you back awake.”

“I fear that you’ll kick me anyway, Dreamlurer or not.”

Five minutes later, they were hovering side by side straight to the closest red dot. He saw her almost lost balance a few times due to getting hit by branches. He prevented himself from throwing her a jab at her lack of experience as a guard.

When they arrived, they found no visible crack in the barrier area. Daniel leaned his face into the barrier to have a closer look but could find no damage in the magic.

“I told you so,” he grinned at Malai.

Malai shrugged. “We still need to check the other sectors just in case.”

Between the ten red dots that indicate damage in the magical barrier, only three exhibited the damage shown by Malai’s software. Daniel resisted the urge to hurl another insult at Malai once he saw that the golems that hovered around his partner was meant for attack and not for surveillance.

He was pressing one of the charm into a little crack in front of him when he heard Malai curse in Thailand. He didn’t notice this before when only surrounded by native Indonesians who spoke English, but being a part of a melting pot of different cultures and ethnicities made him notice that most people had different voices for every language they speak. Malai was a part of the crowd. Her easy, airy English voice turned slightly shrill when she started speaking her mother tongue, making it easy to pick up the Thailand language when she decides to speak it, even when Malai only used it sparingly.

“Code yellow,” Malai murmured darkly. Code Yellow meant that there was multiple open free-for-all in Summer Patria’s magic barrier. “It’s in places we already checked before. every single one of them.” She showed Daniel the tablet. It was one part of the map, zoomed in. A few of yellow dots had appeared in a place they dismissed.

“You saw it yourself. There was not even a single crack.” Daniel said. He averted his gaze to a bothered Malai. “Malai, it might be that your system might have a _flaw_.”

“And if it isn’t? Do _you_ want to be responsible if anything manages to get away?”

Daniel sighed. “What if we go back to central office and call up off-duty guards? If there are multiple cracks like this, even both of our magic won’t cut it. How many off-duty guards are there? The ones that hadn’t checked out of the conservation?”

Malai struggled shortly with her tablet. “Seven.”

“Better than nothing,” Daniel murmured quickly. He wanted to dismiss this thing as trivial, as only happening because of a system that has not been approved by Violet Skarsgard. However, his previous meeting with the _dyr_ disturbed his mind. He shrugged. “Alright. Let’s go back to HQ.” He stepped hard with his shoes and skated pass Malai to central office.

Once he arrived, he saw Malai pass him straight to the guard dorm. Daniel himself stopped in front of the office. He pulled out his phone and turned it on before trying to contact Miss Violet. The only answer was the dial tone without no one picking it up. He called the number a few times before giving up. He settled on sending a message to his aunt to call him.

He only managed to send out the message when he heard of a scream from the dorm direction. He quickly went into the dorm with the floating magic on as he knew it’s quicker in comparison to his own strides. Daniel understood the risk of using the thing indoor and that he was violating a few safety usage codes of those shoes, but he had a bad, icky feeling about the overall situation.

Inside one of the dorm room, he slid in to find Malai punching the chest one of the guard that was sleeping on the lower bunk bed. She looked up at him, her face paling before turning back to a blush. Her breathing sounds irregular and loud against the silence.

Daniel raised his brow at her.

“No one is conscious,” Malai stated before Daniel got to ask any question.

“Huh. Seriously?”

“There’s some kind of... substance, I think, maybe sleeping gas.” Malai answered. “We need to contact Miss Violet.”

“I contacted her before, but she didn’t pick up.”

Malai frowned at him. “Through the office line?”

“No. Called her by phone.”

“Then I’ll try to call her with the emergency unit on the observation deck,” Malai stood up and walked pass Daniel to the exit of the dorm wing of central office. Daniel himself stood quietly in the middle of the door, still floating, with a fierce frown. He noticed that if he hadn’t run from breakfast he might have suffered the same fate as his colleagues.

His brain worked for a bit. If there is an intruder, considering the amount of cracks in the barrier magic, the two of them wouldn’t been even close to enough to protect MCCS, let alone to completely restore the spell; that barrier magic needed a big amount of energy, which meant that the only ones who could disturb it on purpose was a strong magician.

Daniel took two pillow cases from a few of spare beds. He then skated out, almost running into the big board near the exit that marked the work schedule and housed the _Employee of the Month_ graph. His eyes lingered at Malai’s repeating name under the last few months before he went down the stairs.

He stopped on one of the separate building located near the entrance. When he opened it, the smell of a closed damp room greeted his sense of smell. He saw lines of shelves housed charms that were used to daily duties in the conservation. Due to many magical creatures with their own flow and variety of magic, the guards were recommended to use the charms by the weaponry section that only needed to be activated with a keyword to launch, instead of using their own magic. Although to ensure the safety of that magical creatures that these charms were all in a small scale.

He pulled out a box filled to the brim with the fire charms and one jerry-can filled with alcohol that was hidden behind boxes of quarantine charms. Then, he sat cross-legged outside the storage door and started working. He inserted as many fire charms that could fit inside the pillow cases. He had filled one when Malai walked out of central office.

“I’ve contacted Miss Violet and she said she will send a backup in 10 mins...” Malai’s voice disappeared when she approached and finally saw what Daniel was doing. “Okay, what the fuck are you doing?”

Daniel didn’t answer. He flushed the alcohol over the pillow case before moving on to the other one.

“Is that supposed to be... are you building a bomb?”

“Just in case,” Daniel replied without looking.

“Just in case of what?”

“Intruders,” Daniel answered.

“You’re sure that this is the work of someone who’s trying to get _in_ and not get out?”

“Malai,” he started. “The barrier is created by the head of Magical Research Department. That woman is a very strong witch. If there is anyone that had the abilities to disturb that magic, then they must also be a strong witch. Looking from multiple cracks that have happened, and the fact that they’ve put all of the guards but us to sleep, this isn’t the work of one person, but a group. If I had been in the dorm I would be sleeping right now as well.”

 “Lucky you.”

“Lucky _you_ , too.”

Malai quietened. She folded her arms in front of her chest.

“While we’re on the subject, the only creature that was actively trying to get out for the past year was only the gumihos. And you already know that there is no longer any gumiho in this conservation after the last time.” Daniel added. “These cracks are too... organized. Our creatures are strong, magical, and almost extinct... but the cracks they cause by accident shouldn’t be so organized and scattered like this. They would have been in one section at least.”

“And a strong witch could sense other flow of magic, which is why you’re using fire charms and not your own,” Malai took a seat beside Daniel and pulled out a scroll from her waist bag. She activated the magic circle inside the scroll by pressing her hands on it. A light emerged from the scroll that slowly started to form into shapes. Summoning magic, Daniel realized. Two golems the size of a beach ball appeared when she finished. “The golems would be the ones carrying these so our speed isn’t slowed.”

“Good work.” Daniel lifted the pillow cases and fastened it to each of the golem’s teeth. His hand flinched away before his fingertip got bitten.

Malai went back oto her tablet when Daniel did it. “2x3 meter leakage in 7-B,” she muttered.

“That’s the first crack.” Daniel shook his head. It was the first crack he fixed. The place where he met the _dyr_. “And the other cracks?”

“Much smaller. 40 cm max.”

“Not a code red yet, then. Tante Violet should send the back-up soon. We need to work on 7-B first,” Daniel said shortly. He turned on the spell on his boots before sliding to 7-B. He could feel a sense of déjà vu attack him. It was the first place. Is it possible that the intruders meant to distract them from 7-B with those small cracks?

Daniel almost bumped into a large tree when Malai, who was ahead of him, gestured at him to stop alongside the sound of glass hitting the ground. They were more or less still ten meters away from the borders of the conservation. Malai pointed above at the tree that he almost bumped into. Daniel nodded in understanding.

He tugged free one of the pillow cases from the golem and started climbing the tree. After he managed to lodge himself on one of the branches, he pulled out a floating charm and activated it at the surface of the pillow. The bomb then floated beside him, with his hand grasping the corner of the bomb so that it didn’t fly away. Rustling of leaves that was heard when he was climbing sounded like scream in the silence of that forest. Even the birds that he always heard singing and crickets that always accompanied him was not there in the air.

The aerial perspective enabled him to observe that there was a large breakage in the barrier, showing fields of snow that went unending to the horizon. A cold gush of wind blew mercilessly from the hole. Cracks of the barrier, alike glasses shards, were scattered and sparkled over the dry brown leaves on the ground. A group of hooded people had walked into the conservation through the hole; they were wearing anti-pollution masks over their mouths. Only their eyes were visible. They conversed in a language that he couldn’t understand, but the note was familiar, making him frown. It sounded Asian, different from the European slurs that people around him use. He glanced at where Malai was standing behind a tree a meter away from Daniel’s. The two golems were behind her.

“ _Sst_ ,” he almost jumped when he heard the sudden voice behind him. Only luck enabled him to flinch without a sound. He turned to find Malai’s blue golem behind him. It was the same golem that accompanied him before. Didn’t Malai call it a name before? Gianna, was it?

Malai’s whisper came out of the mouth of the Golem. “Get ready to throw the bomb to that group. Wait for my signal.”

Daniel only rolled his eyes. He turned back to the intruders. The one that stood in the front acted like a leader, commanding his friends to the direction of the forest. Malai’s signal didn’t come, even when one of the intruders seemed to walk away.

He gritted his teeth. He directed his hand to throw the bomb into the middle of the group. Behind him, Gianna let out a voice that sounded like a curse. He could see one of the big golems darted quickly behind it, but not the one carrying Daniel’s bomb. Daniel turned to Malai in disbelief.

 _CRACK_!

The wind from the explosion was the first thing that greeted him, complete with the heat in the air thanks to the amount of fire charms in those pillow cases. Shards of clay flew everywhere, hitting the tree bark and even Daniel’s bomber jacket sleeve. His ears rung from the explosion. He saw the golem that’s been with him the entire time opening its mouth, letting out a sound that he couldn’t hear over the ringing that was still filling his ear.

“Why the fuck did you fuck up—“ Daniel yelled in frustration as he couldn’t hear his voice under his still-ringing ears.

He hadn’t even finished his rage when he felt something pulling his body down to the ground. His back hit the earth at once, expelling air by force from his lungs, making him curl up in pain. His eyes watered, his sense of sight blurring. The pain in his back had not disappeared when another pain appeared: the pressure of a shoe on his chest.

His gaze trailed over to the shoe on his chest—it was an expensive leather shoe, alike of those brand-name pumps that he’d seen in Aksa’s house—to the owner. He seemed taller than his other three friends. One was still laying down on the ground, most likely the one that got the most impact from the blast. His eyes looked cold. It sent a shiver down Daniel’s spine.

His accent was a familiar tilt of voice that deepened when he started talking in English: “You. All the guards should be unconscious right now.”

Going against his common sense, Daniel’s mouth curled into a mocking grin. The soles pressed harsher against his chest, but Daniel maintained the grin in his face by pride alone. “Maybe I’m not human,” he answered lightly.

“No, you’re human alright. Those were fire charms. I didn’t detect it at all before you throw it.”

“There’s a lot of creatures other than human that can use magic charms,” Daniel answered, coughing again.

The intruder’s gaze darted to the symbol on the right side of his bomber jacket. “There’s no magical creature that could use magical charms,” he pressed down even more, as if to accentuate his point.

Daniel coughed once more. He realized that this person knew a bit about magical biology. He grabbed the intruder’s ankle, pressing it away from his chest. He was struggling to breathe at this point.

“Are there any other conscious guards?”

When Daniel didn’t answer him, he stepped on him even further. God, if this was another situation, he would’ve even find this _hot_. At this moment, though, all he felt was a great deal of pain—he had to get out of this lock quickly. He bend his knees and stepped on his soles quickly, turning on the floating magic. The sudden movement made the intruder lose balance. Daniel threw the intruder’s leg, sending him hobbling to the back.

Quickly, Daniel used the floating magic to lunge his weight into the intruder, straight to the tree behind the tall man. He seized the man’s mask at once.

“Malai, your golem—record this person’s face!” he yelled, still staring to the guy in front of him. He has Asian features, with a tanned skin and a thick, pouting lips. There was something in his feature that looked familiar to him. “Now for fuck’s sake!” he yelled at the direction of the other intruders.

He heard the rustling from the bushes. He saw Malai’s golem, one of them with the other bomb, crashing into the other intruder. He turned to the one that was still below him. He raised his fist to whack the man’s nose but halted at once when something crashed into the back of his head, making him unconscious.


	3. Chapter 3

Daniel opened his eyes for the second time that day: this time he was greeted by the view of unfamiliar white ceilings. _Is this... hospital?_ He forced himself to sit, ignoring the sickness he felt all over, in particular his throbbing head. He looked down and realized he was laying on a black couch, his feet on top of the armchair. Looking to the side, his sling bag was slumped on the floor. There was a turned-off television and a coffee table in front of the couch. A variety of newspaper and half-drunk, coffee-stained coffee mugs in variety of colors was on top of it.

He raised his hand to his head and winced. A bandage was wrapped around his head. When he pulled his hand back, there was blood in his fingertips.

He sat up. It took him a few seconds to realize where he was. He might have concussion after all. The recreation room in the guard’s dorm was somewhere he usually didn’t find himself in, mostly because he felt and was unwelcome amidst the foreigners who tend to gossip about him. Not that he blamed them. He wasn’t unqualified to be here—he just wished they don’t act friendly in front of him.

Daniel smelled a burning smell in the air. The pain in his head reminded him what he was doing before he lost consciousness. Like electrocuted, he stood up and walked out of the recreation room to the very empty corridor. He followed the smell down to the kitchen which was only two doors away.

A brown-haired girl had her back on him. The heart that was pounding in his chest calmed down. His stride is light and relaxed as he walked to the girl’s side.

Malai’s position in front of the kitchen window showered her face with light. Her long hair, usually tied up neatly, was loose over her shoulders.

“Malai,” his voice scratched harshly against his throat. “What happened?”

“Woke up at last,” Malai turned to him. In her hand was a saucepan that sizzled even without a fire under it. The rim of the egg she was cooking was starting to burn.

“Those intruders...”

“They escaped after threatening to kill you if I didn’t follow their instruction. You don’t have concussion. I checked.” Malai put down the egg on a white plate that she had already prepared. “They took a _dyr_ away. The backup didn’t make it in time. They’re now taking care of the press.”

“Seriously?” His voice was raised. “That’s impossible...”

Malai squinted her eyes at him. “What is?”

“I met a _dyr_ earlier, before all of this happened.”

“When?”

“Before, when I was fixing B-7... didn’t you see this? Your golem was still there.”

Malai stared at him for a little before shaking her head. “No. I must’ve missed it. Is that something important?”

Daniel frowned. He just found the coincidence interesting. A _dyr_ was seen near the crack that they went in through. “Maybe it’s just coincidence,” he decided to shrug it off. Was he only relating one unrelated thing to another? He glanced down at the watch around his left wrist. However, neither arms of the clock were moving. Checking it at once, he discovered that it wasn’t broken, the setting mode was just accidentally pressed. “You’re wearing a watch right? What time is it now?”

Malai glanced at her watch. “14:39.”

“How long was I out?”

“3 hours... maybe.”

That was quite long... Daniel fixed his watch quickly. The thing wasn’t powered on battery but with electric magic, a gift from Aksa when they were high school that he treasured dearly. Beside telling the time, it also had a slot that told you what day is it and a line of symbols that lit up to signal the weather. His brow suddenly risen. Something lurched inside his stomach. _Thursday_? This is a _Thursday_?

Malai pulled out a chair from below the dining table and put her plate in front of it. Beside eggs, there was a slightly-too-overcooked bacon on it.

_Fuck_.

Daniel took a deep breath while his brain processed the whole situation. “Ami and Aksa were going to come visit tomorrow,” he started, his attention elsewhere.

“Didn’t you say that they can’t come here? Isn’t Aksa the one involved with the project to decrease emission gas?” Malai asked as she chewed pieces of bacon.

“It’s done,” replied Dani. “Since last week, actually, but Ami can’t make it due to work. They only got to fly today from Indonesia. 26 hours from Soekarno-Hatta. Unfortunately, due to his accident I probably can’t meet them.”

His voice remained light and calm as he walked out of the kitchen. His feet brought him to the direction of the board with everyone’s work schedule that was located near the stairs. Slowly, he made his way there and halted in front of the board. He started searching for his name and found it down below, not the last name but just a line before the last. _Daniel Haryawijaya_. His gaze trailed to the days he possessed a work shift: Sunday, Wednesday, Thursday. Just right below his name was Malai Kadesayurat. Her shift was Sunday, Wednesday and Friday.

“Anjing,” he cursed in his mother tongue. It all made sense. The accent—the language. It was _hers_.

He felt the entirety of his body that was still covered with soot. There’s only one fire charm—the kind which form was paper, with a smaller scale than the sphere charms—and another fire charm inside the lining of his pants. Anything else was in his sling bag, including his magic medium, a stake with one garnet adorning it, and the thing was located on the other side of the dorm. It wasn’t like he couldn’t do magic without it, but his magic had always been unstable, either failing or too intense. He couldn’t risk it.

“Tai. Tai. Fuck.”

Eluding was out of the question. A ward was placed around the conservation, making it unable for basically everyone to Elude, so it wasn’t possible either to teleport back to the recreation room.

“Daniel? You OK there?” Malai’s voice came out of the kitchen.

At the end, he pulled out both fire charms. They were his last resort. He glanced down at his boots. Like always, a wild idea ran through his brain. He activated his boots. It was crazy, it was impulsive, and he certainly had no idea if it’d work or not, but he didn’t have many choices here.

“Where’s the backup? I need to meet them,” Daniel raised his voice so Malai could hear him.

“I think they’re still busy. Why?”

“I saw one of their faces.”

“Really?” Malai sounded disinterested.

“Yeah. When I crashed into him I managed to pry his mask away. Didn’t you see?”

There was a pause. When Malai answered, she didn’t sound as calm as before. “No. maybe he was already wearing his mask once you’re unconscious.”

_Christ, what kind of fucking reasoning is that_? “Weird,” he replied. “I was _sure_ I was holding on to the mask.”

“Maybe he’s nimble.”

Daniel closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Malai, you can tell me. What did they say?”

“What do you mean?”

“You heard me. Before. They were speaking in Thai,” Daniel slowly approached the kitchen door. Not having to touch the ground enabled him to move stealthily. “Listen. I’m sure that you didn’t mean to do this. Did they threaten you to it? Did they threaten your family?”

Blood was pounding in his ears. He stopped moving. He tried to listen, but he couldn’t hear any movement from the kitchen. The light from the kitchen illuminated the dark corridor. He gulped, feeling his throat dry. Even his hands trembled.

“You have no schedule today,” Daniel added.

He had readied his heart for an ambush, but still he flinched when the beach-ball sized golem appeared suddenly from the kitchen. When it tried to go at his face with its jagged teeth, Daniel threw the fire charm inside its mouth.

“ _Incendo!_ ”

Daniel then threw his body back while covering his face from the blast. He only lowered it after a muffled explosion was heard in that corridor. The golem sprawled lifelessly in the floor with its mouth opened, smoke coming out of it. A shiver went down his spine once he noticed that the golem’s teeth was made out of steel. The rune around its ‘eyes’ was not of a surveillance golem. It was for _offence_.

That fucking bitch meant to hurt him severely.

“Malai!” he yelled. His voice echoed against the silent corridor. “You fucking traitor—“

He heard sound of a broken glass. Shit. He forgotten that the kitchen window wasn’t barred. He skated inside quickly, every kind of curses that he had learnt over the years spilling from his lips—

—only to found his (already hurting) head hit by a cold object.

The force from the punch made him lose his balance. Once it detected no surface under it, the boots became unstable and sent him falling down to the cold floor. His vision blurred once more. He raised his gaze upwards: a Malai-shaped figure stood above him. He tried to grab her feet, but a snare stopped his hand from doing so and tied it to the floor.

“You—how dare you—“ His sentence was cut from another snare that wrapped around his mouth, stopping him from speaking.

Without another word, Malai only turned away. Daniel could see that the window near the stove was completely broken. He struggled against the bondage. It was fruitless. It even had the nerve to tie around him tighter the more he struggled.

He could only watch helplessly as Malai stepped over him and left him alone with the snare. A rage washed over him.

 

*

 

Two hours later, Miss Violet’s stepped inside the kitchen with Louboutin shoes and almost ruined Daniel’s face with the red heel if he hadn’t scream wordlessly to warn anyone that dared to go inside the kitchen. Violet Skarsgard commanded her two assistants—Rosette with the red hair and Sareena that wore a veil—to use magic to release him from the bind. A few minutes later, only red marks on his skin remained.

Once he could sit in one of the dining chair, Violet pulled out a chair across of him and started interrogating it. With one swipe of her hand, glass shards and plates that was still only lying around was tidied by invisible hands. After Daniel finished telling her what had happened, the red marks on his skin had disappeared, and the kitchen was spotless.

Although he hadn’t mentioned the _dyr_ he met yet.

“One of my underlings will check your memory of the intruder you saw,” Violet stood form her chair and pulled out her phone. “I need to go now. I need to submit a report to Interpol—“

“Wait,” Daniel only said that quietly, but it was enough to stop Violet from leaving. “There’s something I haven’t told you.”

Violet turned to him. “What is it?”

“Before—or rather during this incident, I met a _dyr_ near the border of the conservation.”

Violet, who was still fiddling with her phone at this point, suddenly put it down inside her coat pocket. She turned her body completely to Daniel. A little smile rose on the corner of her mouth as she leaned in, her long, bony fingers wrapping around the edge of the chair. “Then?” Her usually emotionless voice, flat and professional, now sounded intrigued. “Did it talk to you?”

Daniel squinted at her. “What?” The hand that was pressing ice against the wound on his head lowered down. His intel on _dyr_ that he read from the books never mentioned anything about _dyr_ initiating contact with human, let alone a _conversation_. “It isn’t anything like that. She just... appeared, eating grass.”

“’She’?”

“What?”

“Where did you know that it’s female?”

Daniel frowned, not even realizing he had made the distinction. “I don’t know?”

“Huh.” Violet let go of the chair. She stepped away. “I need to make sure. Is there anything you haven’t mentioned? Especially about the _dyr_?”

Daniel thought for a bit. His frown deepened as he tried to remember. Putting down the ice pack on the table, he continued, “Well... when I met the _dyr_ , I was tempted to touch it. I don’t even know why, I was only... it doesn’t matter, but the golem—Malai’s golem—prevented me from doing so.”

“What was the type? Surveillance or offense?”

He remembered that damn blue golem, of course. Gianna. “Surveillance,” he answered surely. This was the only information that he could say with confidence.

“Was it active when you met her?”

“Most likely. I mentioned this to Malai, she said she missed it completely. Also... the golem didn’t act like it always do.”

“What do you mean?”

“Malai doesn’t like me that much. Those things feel what she feels as much as the other way, imprinting her feelings. So... they usually just fly away once the job’s done or even tried to take a bite of me. But Gianna wasn’t a threat until I tried to touch the _dyr_.”

Violet turned her gaze downwards. She did not speak for the moment after, thinking over what he had told her. “I see,” she said at last. She slid her hand inside her black coat before pulling out a small vial that contained a pale red liquid. “This is for your head. It’s a healing potion, very good and expensive. It will heal you at once.” She put it on Daniel’s hand.

He stared at it dumbly. It was only the size of his pinky finger.

“One more thing,” Violet started. Daniel nodded, following. The woman, his uncle’s wife, smiled gently to his direction. “If you encounter the _dyr_ again, you have to tell me if that kind of thing happened again. At once. Even the smallest of interaction.”

“O... okay, Miss.”

“Tante,” Violet corrected him quickly. “I don’t care if I’m in a meeting with a president. If I don’t pick up my phone, you call Rosette. You have her number, right? Tell her it’s about the _dyr_. Understood?”

“Yes,” Daniel nodded with enthusiasm.

“If that’s settled, your schedule should be empty for the next two weeks. Take a holiday. Go back to Indonesia. Michael mentioned how much your mother missed you these past few months.”

Daniel frowned at once. “But, Tante, isn’t it better if I also search for Malai?”

The gentle smile on her face vanished into a strict expression. “No. You possess a personal relation with Miss Kadesayurat. Even if I want you in the search team, it wouldn’t have been wise nor efficient. You need to rest with that kind of concussion, too. Okay?”

Gone was his chance to find her. He lost.

“Got it?” She repeated the question as if it wasn’t a rhetoric that only accept agreement.

“Got it,” Daniel answered meekly.

“Good,” with that, the woman vanished with the sound of her heels against the floor.

Daniel stared at the vial in his hand. He pocketed it inside the inner linings of his bomber jacket, deciding that the wound on his head didn’t warrant a potion that expensive. He needed to not think this as defeat—a two-weeks off meant he could go to Thailand himself to search for the girl. Then he made a quick, mental calculation about the plane fare. No. He didn’t have money to spare after paying back what he owed Aksa a few months ago.

Requesting an Eluding license would take more than two weeks and he couldn’t even afford the big fee at the first place. Neither could he pay an impromptu plane ticket, especially from _here_.

He remembered that Aksa was coming here with Ami and Kama. He had paid for the trip, Daniel knew. Three tickets to Iceland barely punched the slightest of dent to his family’s money. He could explain the situation to Aksa...

Daniel shook his head. No, it isn’t an option.

The Chinese descent man stood up from his seat. He walked to the recreation room and found his sling bag on the same place he had left it. He lifted it up and shuffled around for his phone before finding it. He sent few short quick messages to his friends.

 

**Daniel H**

Yo 16.41

I can’t meet any of you 16.41

U should just walk around Iceland or smth 16.41

Sorry, smth came up w work. Have fun 16.42

 

After sending it, he locked his screen before a torrent of text that requested explanation or forcing him to still meet them hit him. He put his sling bag on his left shoulder.

When the legal way didn’t cut it, of course he still had one choice.

He was going to purchase an illegal Eluding spell.

God, it’s been awhile since he’d done anything _close_ to crime.


	4. Chapter 4

After they stepped down from the plane, Angkasa’s best friend, Amiyandra Andezka Arundaya, had her eyebrows intertwined fiercely. Twenty-three hours flight between Jakarta and Reykjavík, she planted the expression despite persuasions from Aksa’s part, shitty jokes from Kamaya. Her stubborn head practically ignored their efforts.

Not that he blamed the girl, to be honest, he was quite annoyed himself. Aksa let out a heavy sigh. The trolley he was leaning on had a variety of trunks, the biggest one being Kama’s. They were waiting in the car pick up area. Ami sat on a make-shift chair beside the trolley, scowling at her phone.

“Ami,” he called her to no avail. A quick glance to his phone ensured him that she wasn’t receiving a message from the one who canceled their meeting. No news from the one who was picking them up, either. “How long do you plan on sulking? It’s done already. As Dani told us, let’s just have fun. You know he didn’t plan this.”

The screen near them was still showing updates from conservation burglary. It’s been showing the same thing for hours, the news selling like hotcakes. Kama was the only one who was paying attention to the news. The long-haired male squinted at the screen with a lollipop lodged in his mouth.

He pulled it out and asked, “Who do you think will be playing Daniel when they make a biopic about this? Finger’s crossed for an open casting, I’d like to take a shot.” The question wasn’t directed particularly to either of them, but it certainly made Aksa expression turned sour.

“Seriously?” Aksa threw him a frown.

“What?” Kama turned away from the television. He glanced at the girl sitting beside him. “Oh, of course. Ami, let’s just have _fun_ , fuck that guy.”

Ami didn’t seem to hear neither of their encouraging words. She put down her phone and stared far away. Aksa followed her glance: she has her gaze fixed on a street far away. It was empty.

“It’s been a year since he came home,” she suddenly said. “We’re here to meet him and he just cancels like _that_? Am I the only one who’s mad here?”

“He’s working while he studies, it’s a wonder he’s still alive at the first place,” Kama uttered as he adjusted the sunglasses that was perched above his head. The morning light of that foreign place was dim that morning, but the dark glasses wasn’t meant to shelter him from the sun but rather hide the fact that he’d drank too much wine on the plane.

“That’s why we’re here, isn’t it, so that he didn’t need to waste his energy on Eluding? It took us money to get here, now he doesn’t even want to meet us! He doesn’t even want us on his flat!”

“So, what, now you’re taking out that anger on us? We’re not the one who convinced him not to meet you. Are you thick or what?” Aksa replied with poison, starting to lose his patience on Ami’s persistence.

“It’s not like any of you cared.”

“Who said that?”

“I’m the only one who’s pissed!”

“It’s not only you. I paid for this trip. But you have to understand that he has priorities.”

“You’re only thinking about _your_ money.”

“Have you two thought that perhaps this was about the burglary more than anything?” Kama replied distractedly.

“They said that every guard-on-duty had fallen asleep, so what does it have to do with him? He’s not the one who stole it. We’re here only for several days... he doesn’t even have five minutes for us?” Ami’s voice continued raising instead of calming down, sending Kama to scoot away with a shrug. It was clear that he didn’t want to be involved in the argument at the first place.

“OK. Why don’t you just barge into his apartment? I’ll stay back at the hotel—or even walk around here and sightsee—‘cause to be frank I have no interest on hearing you two argue,” Aksa looked away from her.

A SUV approached them from the direction of the city before halting perfectly in front of them. From inside it, a man with pale skin and a blonde buzz cut stepped away from the driver seat. Gunar Stevensson was a man in his late 30s with a sense of fashion that could only be described as “ _dad clothes_ ”. Though the three of them was taller than average, Gunar still towered a few inches above them.

Without caring for Ami’s gaze on his skin, Aksa shook his colleague’s hand. “Hello. It’s been a long time, Gunar.”

“Kass,” Gunar firmly held his hand. His full name was too hard for the Icelandic to pronounce, so the first time he met, he told Gunar to call him Kass.

“You look well.”

“These are all your things?” Gunar gestured at the trolley.

“Did we bring too much?” Aksa threw a pointed glance at Kama, who brought two trunks by himself.

“No, no worries. It’s freezing around here, you’ll need all the clothes you can wear.”

Kama decided it was time to stand up. “Hello. I’m Kama.”

“Gunar Stevensson,” Gunar smiled at him. “There’s only three of you? Didn’t you mention another girl, Kass?”

“She couldn’t make it, unfortunately.”

“Where are we going first? I’d like to take a bite of local shark delicacies,” Kama’s outgoing personality, as always, made it easy for him to already act like Gunar was his long-time friend instead of Aksa’s. He pulled at Ami’s arm. “Mi, where do you want to go first? Have you seen pictures of the black beach?”

Ami only sighed as a reply. She glanced to her phone instead. He could practically _see_ what she was doing. She hadn’t even stand up yet from where she was sitting. Even Gunar exchanged wary glances at them as if trying to gauge the situation.

“Do you want to get in or not? If you’re not going to, go pay for your own ride to the hotel,” he retorted lightly. He saw Kama shook his head at that sentence. What? He was only _telling_ her that.

“ _Nganyelke_ ,” Ami muttered without lifting her head at all.

He didn’t quite understand Javanese, but from the tone he didn’t need to to understand it was an insult. “Then don’t come.” He said in a matter-of-fact manner. Without saying another word, Angkasa turned away and went inside, claiming the shotgun. He slammed the door closed behind him.

Inside the car, he glanced back at the situation from the rearview mirror. Ami stayed quietly on her seat, her body shivering even below layers of jacket and scarf that she was wearing. Angkasa sighed. Was he _too_ harsh? Maybe he shouldn’t have said anything.

Meanwhile, Gunar opened the back of the car. Kama loaded the luggage to the back like he said he would. From the open trunk, he could hear Ami’s loud voice: “I don’t want to talk to that idiot.”

“Then _don’t_. But you got to come with us, okay? I heard the taxi fare is _expensive_.” Kama replied.

Those words made him scoff. He turned away. Worrying over her was a waste of time.

The two finally got in, with Kama sitting behind Aksa and Ami on the other side. Gunar also got in and closed gently the door on his side before starting the engine. “I’m Gunar,” he said to Ami’s direction. His gentle voice was a contrast to his harsh appearance.

“Ami,” he heard Ami’s softening reply.

Quietly, Aksa glanced at him from the mirror on the center of the car. Their gaze met without him meaning to. Ami looked away at once, her frown returning, though her cheek blushed slightly.

Slowly, the car made its way to the bustle of the city, specifically to the direction of the hotel they had booked. Thanks to the fight between Ami and Aksa, an awkward atmosphere hung heavily inside the car. Most of the sound inside came out of the radio, broadcasting a classic rock song that rumbled from the speakers in the sides.

“How is your project, Kass?” Gunar finally broke the silence.

Aksa’s smile was instant. Half pleased because Gunar had brought something that he took pride of, half-pleased because his question had broken whatever awkwardness that started to choke him. “It’s going great. We got a certificate and acknowledgement from the International Green Forum,” Aksa answered easily. He felt like his answer sounded trained, but he was too glad to talk about it to care too much. “Unfortunately, it’ll be hard to implement the device commercially. Production is trying to search for cheaper materials, but I’ve went over it; it will affect its performance.”

“That’s unfortunate. Don’t you have governmental support?”

“Uh, barely. Indonesia’s not like Iceland, it doesn’t care that much about environment,” Aksa shrugged. “And anyway...”

“ _Kepo banget sih_!”

Their conservation halted in an instant by that very familiar Indonesian slang. Aksa could feel his vein twitch in his forehead. Ami was trying to push away Kama’s head with one of her hand, the other hand pulling further her phone from sight.

“Why would you stoop that low to send that kind of long-ass message to him? He’ll just answer with a ‘yes, Ami, sorry’ or ‘lol ok’,” Kama frowned as he tried to avoid Ami’s hand. Aksa couldn’t help but to agree. Arguing with Daniel face-to-face was one thing—but he had an even more annoying tendency of ghosting them when it came to texts.

“This is none of your business.”

“Well, it’s my business, I’m getting dumped too. Besides I already know it only contains a rant about the fact that he doesn’t want to meet you.”

Ami didn’t bother using words to talk to that long-haired man child. She roughly stepped on Kama’s (new, untouched) shoe. Kama howled and cursed at her, more due to the fact that the shoes were new rather than pain. He glared at Ami. Ami replied him with jutting out her tongue.

Angkasa sighed as he stroked the bridge of his nose. He glanced at Gunar and tried to talk over the backseat racket. “Gunar, do you know where the MCCS office is?”

A silence struck the car as soon as that was heard. Ami looked up from her phone. Even Kama, who was on the process of pulling out a sheet of tissue out of an adorable Japan-themed box (another thing from Gunar that surprised Aksa) in the effort of cleaning up the dirt from Ami’s boots from his shoe, halted immediately.

“MCCS? It’s on the suburbs, quite far from the hotel, but we can’t make it this day,” Gunar answered. He didn’t look away from the road.

“Can you drop us today? It won’t be long. I’ll pay for the petrol.”

“Okay. Wait a minute, we got to make a U-turn.”

 “Sa,” Kama leaned into the space between the front seat. “Are you being real about dropping to MCCS? Isn’t there supposed to be press hounding the office or something? We won’t get a permission to get in. Doesn’t Dani work on the conservation and not the office?”

“Relax. We’re only trying to get some information about where he lives. From what I know he lives off-campus, so we needed his personal address, since he’s not giving it to us. We’ll ask Violet Skarsgard directly... she’ll remember us. I met her last year, she was quite nice.”

“You’re being unreasonable. Why would they disclose private information like that? You’re forgetting the part where a burglary just happened on MCCS! They won’t have time for our games.”

“Kama,” Aksa tried to talk in a calm tone although he was getting on his nerves, “someone like Violet Skarsgard has at least three secretaries that can handle this. We’re only trying to meet him. She knows we’re his friends. We’re not trying to, let’s say, get inside illegally or anything.”

“It certainly _feels_ like it is!” Kama shouted exasperatedly. “Can you drop me off to the hotel first? I don’t want to be involved in this.” When his request was met with silence, he turned his target to Gunar. He started to shake Gunar’s shoulder. “Gunar, drop me at the hotel, please?”

“Don’t listen to him,” Aksa pried Kama’s hold on his shoulder. Gunar nodded, but it was clear that he wasn’t enjoying the whole ordeal, even annoyed by the argument that then moved to the front seat. “Kama, sit down.”

Kama was pulled back to the backseat by a force that was so powerful that it slammed Aksa to the seat. The car swayed slightly in the road as Kama struggled against the arms that was holding him back.

“Miss, you shouldn’t have done that,” Gunar glanced from the rearview mirror, although he seemed amused more than anything.

“Sorry, you just don’t want him to go havoc in your car,” Ami replied with a grin. “Sorry, Sa...” she added with a soft voice.

Both Gunar and Aksa nodded. Gunar went back driving, while Aksa turned to the backseat, making sure that there was no other funny business going on in the back.

“Thank you,” Ami murmured, her arms still around Kama. She was smiling brightly.

“It’s nothing,” Aksa replied flatly. He diverted his head back to the road, just to hide the smile on his face, courtesy of seeing Ami’s smile.

He had always been weak for that smile.

The journey to the tall, white building ate another thirty minutes even with the vacant roads. It was a contrast against Indonesia’s roads that were always filled with cars and motorcycles. Aksa spent his time watching the view that passed by. Even for someone who’s claimed that he doesn’t hold special interest in nature, the view took his breath away.

Kama stopped sulking instantly once he’d caught a look at the art deco architecture that the building was designed on. He stared in awe at that building and started taking pictures while rambling about various modern architecture that was in line with that building.

Kamaya Ichwan was an architecture major—at least until he dropped out after four semesters to pursue his acting career, following suit of his film director brother. Aksa remembered when he told them he was quitting; even Daniel was surprised (he’d guessed that he was even pissed) to hear that Kama decided that it just wasn’t his cup of tea. Despite that, his interest on architecture remained. From the knowledge that came out of his mouth, Aksa was half-sure that maybe he wasn’t telling them _everything_ about why he had quit.

The car stopped in front of the lobby. Kama was the first one who stepped out, while Ami lingered a little to fumble with her bag.

After the three of them had stepped away, Aksa went back to Gunar who was still sitting behind the driver seat. He rested his hand on the opened window. “Gunar. I’ll call you when we’re done. You should get a coffee.”

“No worries, Kass. Don’t do anything stupid inside, will you?”

“Thanks man.”

Gunar threw him a small smile before he drove away to the parking area. After they’ve lost sight of his car, Aksa felt a hand on his shoulder. “You haven’t told us where you met Gunar.”

“He’s an engineering student from UCL who did a study on one of Mr. Wiyoko’s project,” Aksa explained briefly as he examined the building behind them. Dion Wiyoko was Aksa’s magical engineering professor in Universitas Indonesia, the one he assisted on his big project creating emission gas reducer in effort of clearing pollution from Indonesia’s air. “I’ve had a few lunches with him when he’s doing the study. He’s Icelandic and quite trust-worthy. Don’t worry about our luggage, he won’t steal it.”

“This is the first time I met a friend of yours that we don’t know already,” Ami retorted.

“He’s not really a friend, just a colleague.”

“Don’t say that. What if Gunar see you as a friend?”

Aksa frowned slightly. He didn’t take it to mind that the other would’ve thought him as a friend. To him, a friend was someone like Ami and Daniel, someone he’d met and talk to regularly and felt compelled to be close with, not someone who was like... Gunar. He was far away and they didn’t even talk before he reached out to him.

“I don’t think he sees me as anything but Mr. Wiyoko’s assistant.”

“If so, how did you manage on hiring him to drive us everywhere?”

“I didn’t exactly... hire him. We exchanged e-mails. He told me to contact him if I ever visited here,” Aksa explained. “So, I sent him an e-mail last week. He said he’d drive us around.”

“So, you _don’t_ pay him.”

“I paid the petrol. I tried to pay for his service, too, but he refused.”

“Sounds like friendship to me,” Kama said suddenly. He didn’t even think Kama was listening to their conversation.

Ami looked like she was going to laugh, confusing Aksa even further. “Let’s just go in.”

They went pass a group of press huddled over row of steel chairs a few meters from the entrance. Once they’d caught wind of a person coming, they glance hungrily at them before losing their interest quickly when they realized that they didn’t look like anyone important. They started talking to each other again.

The entrance was an automatic glass door that slid open once they approached. A Korean man sat behind the receptionist desk, wearing a navy-blue tuxedo with a small silver plate on his right chest: Lee Seung-hwan. His smile was trained to stay on his lips and he had no discerning accent. “Good morning, guests. Is there anything I can help you with?”

“We want to meet Violet Skarsgard,” Aksa explained hurriedly. “Is she in the building?”

“Miss Skarsgard is usually readily available, but she isn’t meeting anyone without any appointment at the moment. As you already know, there’s been a crime that happened in the conservation,” Lee explained. The smile on his lips didn’t so far as to twitch. “If you are members of the press, you’re welcomed to wait outside. The conference will start at 2.”

“We’re not press... we’re not really trying to meet Miss Violet directly...”

“We!” Ami cut suddenly. Instantly, both Aksa and the receptionist diverted her attention to her. “We’re actually her niblings. _Tante_ Violet. Of course you knew about her marriage to Michael Haryawijaya one year ago.”

“Of course I have that knowledge, yes—“

“Yes, we’re the Haryawijayas. I’m Tanya Haryawijaya’s daughter. She’s the baby sister of Michael? We have a very pressing matter that needed her attention directly,” even though she was slightly struggling to speak English so fast, she didn’t seem bothered—the lie just seemed so natural in her lips she might’ve even been telling the truth. Aksa only stared at her, not wanting to intervene, though his gaze stayed on her lips, his full attention of every of her words.

On the contrary, Lee’s gaze darted between them before settling at a very pale Kama. Kama was glaring at Ami with a panicked face. Aksa stepped on his shoes discreetly.

“ _NGG_.” The silence felt like light-years as Kama struggled to talk. He forced a smile. “Uhh.. no English.”

Luckily, his stupidity seemed convincing.

Before Kama roused any suspicion, Aksa smoothly put his hand on the counter to take the spotlight from Kama. He smiled his best, charming smile at Lee; a poor imitation of something that Sena used to do, back when he was still in high school. Aksa didn’t lie often, but Sena taught him all his tricks by the time he’d went to Austria. “It’s very important. If we only could meet her assistant, that’s mighty fine as well. The problem is that it’s very personal, we need to make sure that it’s only heard,” he gave it a meaningful pause, “by people close to Auntie.”

Lee stared at Aksa for a little. Then, he nodded. “If that is the situation, I hope you’re not in a hurry. I’ll try contacting Miss Rosette.”

“Thank you,” the three of them said in unison.

The receptionist talked briefly to his Bluetooth headset. Aksa paid a close attention to him, wary that he was calling the police instead of Violet’s assistant, but the language he was speaking with seemed foreign and couldn’t be understood. Sighing, he turned to his friends. They were staring daggers at each other.

Before any fight able to broke out, Lee coughed to earn their attention. They turned to him. Lee pointed at an empty wall in the right side of the lobby.

“You can take the elevator there. Miss Rosette informed me that Miss Violet will meet you.”

The three of them stared at the empty wall before glancing back at Lee with eyebrows raised.

“Oops, sorry,” Lee lifted an aluminum wand with what seemed to be gold etchings all over. He drew something in the air with the end of the wand. The gold etchings slowly lit up, leaving marks of transparent gold light in the air in form of a magic circle in Chinese alphabets around it. The mark slowly disappeared after a few seconds, but the marble wall he was pointing at blurred.

The wall dissolved into sand in front of their eyes, disappearing as soon as it hit the ground. Where the wall used to be was replaced by steel elevators. Kama gasped loudly in awe. Aksa couldn’t even hold back his grin. It was a stunning magic.

They walked inside the elevator. Aksa could feel the electric energy of technomancy flowing orderly inside the walls of the elevator, hidden below a material that seemed like something used in a normal elevator. The door slid closed. Beside the door was usually a panel with floors that you could go to, but there was only one button in that elevator: a black silhouette of a dyr. Aksa pressed the button. The elevator lurched into movement.

“This is fucking dope. They combined non-magical architecture with magical engineering,” Kama rambled with great enthusiasm. His voice drowned out the boring elevator music. “But,” his tone changed at once, “ _why did you fucking lie_?”

“Because telling the truth won’t get us anywhere,” Ami answered.

“It’s fine, we’re not really lying. Daniel is her nephew after all,” Aksa responded flatly, not interested in hearing another argument.

“Which part of that is ‘not really lying’?” He shook his head furiously at the both of them. “Doesn’t this count as fraud? _Please_ tell me it doesn’t count as fraud. Okay. How about I’ll tell them that you two force me into this with _violence_?” He said the last word at Ami’s direction.

“You’re blowing things out of proportion. At worst... they’ll kick us out.”

Aksa was more interested in focusing his gaze to the symbols that appeared on top of the elevator door. He didn’t quite understand the symbols, but he deduced it was Nordic runes that he’d sure he’d look somewhere. It was unconventional, to use an old form of magic for magical engineering. Technomancy itself was more of a sophisticated combination of contemporary magic—elemental and newer forms of binding—it seemed rare to use runes for it.

The elevator halted abruptly, preventing the argument from going further. The two of them screamed in surprise. Aksa held Ami’s shoulder protectively to maintain her balance. They both shared an embarrassed glance before he let go of her shoulder.

Meanwhile, the door slid open. The view in front of them was more surprising than the jolt of the elevator. In front of them was field of grass with bushes and trees, green dominating wherever they glance. On top of them, he could hear bird singing in the open, blue sky.

Aksa stepped out of the elevator, his mouth hanging open as he looked around. Even the air felt like summer, making their layers of clothing seemed unnecessary. “Wow,” he twirled to see the view in full. A transparent butterfly perched softly on Ami’s shoulder, earning a laugh from her.

It took them awhile to enjoy the view before they realized that there was a red-haired woman watching them amidst the trees. She had her eyebrow raised, but she kept her silence.

“Sorry,” Aksa felt embarrassed, but could anyone blame him? The entirety of this place felt and looked out of this world. “We’re here to meet Miss Violet.”

The woman, Rosette, tilted her head, before smiling meaningfully. “I’m Rosette, her assistant. You must be her niece and nephews. I’ll escort you to her.” Rosette then turned away and started walking, leaving them to stare at her confusedly. They didn’t even get to ask—nor admit—that they lied.

“Shouldn’t she know the Haryawijayas by faces by now?” Kama asked.

“God, just go along with it for now,” Aksa started walking to catch up with her.

Behind him, he heard Kama grumbled. “Guess we’re going to jail!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A few translations:
> 
> Nganyelke: annoying/irritating in Javanese. Ami is a Central Javanese girl. She likes to insult other people in her language, it just feels more satisfying.  
> Kepo banget sih: "Kepo" is an Indonesian (Hokkien) slang, it means "really curious", usually used against a person who wants to know about everything. In this case, despite Ami not wanting Kama to know the content of her message to Daniel. The whole sentence basically means "why do you want to know so bad?" On the other hand, Daniel's family used Hokkien since he's from Pekanbaru, so you know where exactly Ami learned the slang. ;)


	5. Chapter 5

Daniel sighed over the steaming cup of black coffee in front of him. The coffee shop he frequented to was usually filled to the brim with pretentious hipsters—but the day was young, and locals seemed to prefer to spend their morning in the fish market, restaurants that provided breakfast with proper nutrition, or even their own house. Usually he held the same opinion as those locals, mostly to save the money he earned from his wages for other recreational things. That day was different.

 Anxiously he peered at his phone on the table. The black iPhone with cracked corners only stared back at him with no indication of changing from the last time he’d took a glance at it. He put the phone back beside the ceramic coffee mug before continuing his activity of people-watching. He’d picked this spot, a long table glued on the storefront’s glasses, just to do so.

Unfortunately, none of those people passing was the one he’s waiting for.

His hand itched to reach for the cloves cigarette that he tucked inside the bomber jacket he wore. Instead, he took another tiny sip of his coffee. It tasted much better than any of the instant one he used to drink every morning in Jakarta, but sometimes he missed the taste of Kapal Api in the back of his throat, and he knew if he had to purchase another cup, he’d have to forget what “healthy” dinner tasted like and settled on instant ramen for a week.

Despite his best efforts not to, he glanced back to his phone. It was 9 am in the morning. His best friends should’ve landed in Reykjavík by then. Thinking about them made his head ache. As if the _dyr_ burglary hadn’t been big enough of a mental sport for him, he’d have to think about making the most convincing of reasons to avoid from meeting them and all the things he would do to make Ami forgive him.

Considering the LINE notification that just popped to his screen, it seemed like a poor man’s dream.

Daniel flipped his phone until it faced the table. A groan came out of his mouth as he laid his head down to the table and started messing with his short, black hair. His phone vibrated. He flipped it slightly and let it hit back against the table once he saw Ami’s name on the screen.

“What’s wrong with you?”

The voice behind him made him straighten at once. Turning, there was a woman, only one or two years older than him, who tilted her head and chuckled at his antics. Selena Berg was a tall, lanky woman with neon blue hair, was wearing a black bralette under a leather jacket even at this temperature; everything in her looks like a warning. She pushed her hair to her back and stared at him.

“It’s nothing,” he gestured for her to take a seat beside him. “You’re late, Lena.”

Lena sat herself on the chair like she owned it. Her smile was wolfish, accentuated by dark brown lips that made her teeth look sharper. “I have to admit I was surprised to see you pursue my services. Guessing it has something to do with your work,” she darted for Daniel’s coffee and took a sip. “You never contacted me for this thing before, let alone an illegal bypass. Didn’t you say you’re through with anything illegal?”

Daniel warily looked around to ensure no one was close enough to hear their conversation. He lowered his voice. “Lena, don’t you have any sense of cautiousness?”

“I live for the thrill of being chased.”

“I _don’t_ ,” Daniel replied. He grabbed his coffee from her, putting it back to the table. He’d be more pissed if this wasn’t something that had to be expected from her. “Listen, I’d like to walk out from here without any criminal records, okay? You’re the only one I know who’s still involved—and good enough to not rouse suspicion.”

“I’d be flattered if I don’t know that you don’t exactly have any friends around here.”

“Fuck off.”

The Nordic girl laughed. She threw her sling bag to the table without caring so much if it’ll bump into the coffee mug. Her bag had variety of patches on sewed neatly to the leather, most of them signaling her leftist political alliance. He had met her in Icelandic Magical Biology Institute’s library, sitting cross-legged on the ground between the deepest shelves with a book of potion herbs in her clean, not-ash-stained hands. Her flaming blue hair, the lines of piercings in her ears and her studded boots made him stop at the edge of the shelf and almost run away. Almost. She looked up and he stopped.  She’d caught of the botany book he was holding for an essay and offered to help as long as he doesn’t report her to the librarian.

It wasn’t like he was scared—or thought bad—of Lena to want to run away as soon as possible when he saw her appearance. It was the fact that she struck a flame inside him, lighting up a dark part of him that he thought he’d left far behind in Jakarta.

Like most things, it was more about Daniel than it ever was about anyone else.

Lena pulled out a parchment of paper with a magical circle with symbols that he didn’t comprehend. With it, a needle with blackened point. “Hand,” he heard her mutter.

Daniel put his left hand forward. Lena raised an eyebrow at him.

“Oh, Lord, I’ve forgotten you’ve never done this before,” she chuckled. She gestured at his jacket. “Take your uniform off, sweetheart.”

Daniel felt his cheeks warming, despite telling himself that it was humane for him to not understand the bases of something so foreign. “You should’ve told me first,” he took off his bomber jacket and put it gently on the table. To others it might’ve seem tacky to be wearing your work-assigned work jacket everywhere, but the jacket from MCCS was a symbol of pride, acting like varsity jackets than uniform, even though it was doubtful that he deserved it or not. “I’ve done alcohol and weed, but when it comes to smuggling yourself to another country...”

“No one’s telling you to chase that girl to her home country,” Lena pulled at his left hand, wrapping her fingers around his wrist. She brandished the needle like a pencil. “This will hurt a little, but you’ll manage.”

“Oh, don’t underestimate me.”

Lena chuckled and started pricking at his skin with the needle, following the outline of the magic circle she had in her other hand. Daniel winced quietly. He didn’t expect the needle to be hot at his skin: with every prick, the line started glowing an orange, dim light.

“Didn’t you say those two people are coming here?” Lena suddenly disturbed the silence between them. Her fingers moved smoothly on his skin. Seemed like she’d done it for thousands of times. “You know, the ones you said pulled you out from hell during high school?”

Daniel glanced at his phone who was suddenly quiet. “Yeah, actually,” he shrugged one shoulder. “I don’t have time for them though. I can’t waste my time, I need to go after Malai to Chiang Mai...”

“Why?”

“Huh?”

“Doesn’t your auntie have her own people chasing Kadesayurat there?”

“Of course she does,” he answered seriously. “I just felt... responsible. I could’ve prevented it from happening if I had paid attention. There were so many signs.” He stroked at the bandage around his head. “It’s just that I _trusted_ that damn traitor.”

“It’s not your fault, you know,” Lena glanced him from under her blond lashes, “even if you weren’t there, they still would have done it and succeeded, from what I’ve heard from the situation.”

“There’s just one thing that disturbed me.”

“Which is?”

“Violet Skarsgard must have received notification that her barrier was weakening. Even I have sent a message about it to her. But it’s only hours later that she came back to the conservation. Even though it _is_ her greatest priority. Isn’t that weird?”

“Maybe something,” she pricked too hard that he winced, “sorry. Maybe something prevented her from coming.”

“Makes sense. She could have been meeting with one of the High Council pricks when this is all happening,” Daniel winced again when Lena pricked him repeatedly. “Doesn’t that mean that there’s someone from High Council in this issue? The one who prevented her from going back to Iceland?”

“Well, if the shoe fits...”

“That’s impossible.”

“Daniel Tan,” the girl pressed the last rune in Daniel’s skin before letting go of his wrist. The blood that stained her fingertips she cleaned on the dark denim jacket she was wearing. Meanwhile, Daniel cringed slightly at the mention of the last name. _Tan_. Some days he wished he hadn’t talk about that name to her. “There’s nothing impossible in this world when we’re talking politics. Especially when it comes to international magical relations like High Council. Now, the puzzle you _need_ to solve is why someone from High Council would risk their position for a mere _dyr_.”

Daniel stared at the red marks that was still on his skin. “How about money?”

“The High Council position cost more than that.”

“Power?”

“They couldn’t get rid of Kubo that easily.”

Kubo was the Head of High Council, known for his steel-handed way in handling international magic relations. He was generally respected by the international community, though disliked by people who didn’t appreciate the just way he handled magical discourse.

“I just don’t quite get why,” Daniel ruffled his hair. “There’s other creatures in the conservation that sells way more and far more useful than _dyr_ —why did they just took her? Why did they risk planting Malai into the system only to acquire something so... useless?”

“That’s a question neither of us can answer,” Lena gave him a shrug. She put her things back inside her bag. “But if you want to start wondering about international politics or have any indication of joining us reds, then you’ll be asking questions I’d love to answer.”

“You know I have no intention of doing so,” Daniel frowned at his friend.

“You’re wounding your Dad’s heart, babe,” Lena replied with a make-shift innocent grin.

“My Dad is dead,” he stated. “Because of that.”

“Your father didn’t die because of that, trust me.”

It was a waste of time trying to convince Lena about his father. Once she had found out his surname, the first time she did was trying to find out his background. Although that was something that Daniel could understand, as living as Lena was quite dangerous, he didn’t appreciate her changed attitude once she had found out who his father is. “Whatever,” he ended up saying.

“Don’t be too sad,” Lena grabbed his coffee again and drank it again. Daniel couldn’t even manage to protest. The way she was drinking it ensured that he wouldn’t be drinking again. “How do you want to pay for my services? I take PayPal, Bitcoin, and Venmo.”

“Venmo. Just send me the details through chat later.” He snorted as he glanced inside his now-empty mug. His phone vibrated again. He lifted it and scanned the screen. It wasn’t Ami, rather an unknown number:

 

_Your friends are here on the conservation._

_You should come._

_They lied about being Miss S’s niece._

_-R._

 

Daniel’s gaze at the screen was pointed. “Ah. _Bangsat_.” He cursed. “ _Bangsat. Orang-orang goblok_.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m getting fired thanks to my friends,” he replied quickly, putting his things inside his sling bag in a hurry. “They lied to get inside MCCS—they were saying they are my siblings.”

“Wow. They have more balls than you.”

“Are you being serious right now, Berg?” He glanced at her, full of poison. He should’ve been used by then how she could make jokes out of serious situations, especially situations that didn’t consider laws like this, but with the _dyr_ burglary and this particular thing, he wasn’t in the mood to be joking around over the fact that he could be fired. “I can get fired for real.”

“Dan, you’re the nephew of the owner of MCCS who just married your uncle. If there’s one thing that could get you fired, it’s only if you quit.”

“I need to go,” he put on his jacket hurriedly before putting his sling bag across his chest. “Thank you for helping me. You’re an angel.”

“That’s something I don’t hear often, but only for you, kiddo,” she waved what looked like a carton box in the air. “You don’t mind if I take this too, right?”

Daniel squinted his eyes at the box Lena was holding. He only noticed by then that the clove cigarettes that used to be tucked inside his jacket was swiped by Lena. He snorted and rolled his eyes, already used by her devil-may-care attitude.

“Just take it.” He didn’t have time to beg his cigarettes back. It was a waste of time trying to make Lena give up anything she already rightfully acquired.

“Thanks.” The Nordic girl put the cigarettes inside her leather jacket. “Oi, Dan?”

“Yeah?”

Lena pulled him by his collar and left a short peck on his left cheek. “Good luck with your search.”

He grinned. “Thanks. See you next semester, Berg.”

“You too, Tan.”

With that, Daniel closed his eyes and Eluded out of the coffee shop to the MCCS office. His body disappeared from the room, leaving a slight white mist and a scent of _hio_  in the air.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TL notes:  
> * "Bangsat. Orang-orang bodoh." - Technically means "Fuck. Idiots."  
> * Hio is a praying incense.


	6. Chapter 6

Across the stones, Aksa could see an open building area which seemed like the only living human relic against the nature all around it. The only protection from the forest was the seven-meter tall steel fences around the building. Even with fences that tall, Aksa could see a layer enveloping the entirety of fences, reflecting the sunlight that fell on it, forming a dome on the outside of the fences. He deduced it was a barrier magic.

“We have a lot of dangerous creatures, so we need additional protection,” Rosette talked the way people in black and white European cinema Sena used to love did; rolled her rs and slurred the words slightly, though it was still clear in Aksa’s ear. “As the central for the European sector, we hold the most creatures from other conservations.”

“Miss Skarsgard’s office is in here too?” Aksa asked again as they stepped on the porch.

“Actually, it isn’t. Due to the burglary that happened yesterday, though, she’s here on the field.”

“We actually don’t want to disturb her. We don’t need to meet her in person.”

Rosette’s answer was quick and lightning. “She instructed to bring all of you to her at once. She has an important guest in there, but the matter will be the finished quickly.” Her smile sparkled under the sun.

Aksa turned back to his other friends who had only been listening the entire time. Kama’s tanned skin looked pale. Sweat was running down his forehead. On his side, Ami’s brows furrowed tightly, a serious expression that he recognized from years of knowing her. Aksa sighed softly before turning away. This might not have been a good idea after all.

However, it had been done already. Walking inside said building, Aksa was surprised to find that the interior seemed like a normal apartment, like the ones you could find easily in Jakarta, rather than anything else office-like. Rosette guided them to climb the stairs across the entrance. Aksa thought that it wouldn’t be outright wrong to ask for Violet to call Daniel directly. The risk could be handled later.

Daniel had relayed the news that he was going to move to Iceland for college and work two months after his uncle’s wedding to Violet. He did not say anything about it before, but with the visas and documents required, Aksa knew that he would have known for months prior. Aksa could still remember how somber Ami had been, although she tried to smile and be supportive for her childhood friend’s decision, even in the last day, where they had a going away party in a café in Kemang before spending their last night together in Aksa’s house.

What Daniel did not know that night, after Daniel went home at 3 am, the smell of wine and beer hanging low around him, Aksa was the one who watched as Ami’s shoulder trembled under the dim light of his terrace. The smile she had been sporting disappeared after that.

Two years after, Daniel only went back to Jakarta once, even with the Eluding license that he had acquired. One reason that he always used was how busy he was. His mother and sisters often went there to meet him, making his trip to Jakarta even less than necessary.

Meanwhile, what Ami and Aksa (and Kama and Caca to some extent) got was forced Skype calls, empty apologies, and... whatever _this_ was. There was a few of reasons why Aksa decided to pay for the airplane fare to go here. Ami was one of those reasons.

Aksa’s thought fled to Antariksa, his big brother, who had the same habit. Although there were no sweet phone calls between them, to him, Anta and Daniel were the same kind of selfish person.

 His sneakers stepped on fine wood shards scattered on the floor. He raised an eyebrow, meaning to bend over to pick it up, but before he could do so, Rosette coughed and gestured at them to follow the corridor on the left. Aksa’s gaze then fell to a big announcement board filled with names and days; it must have been a schedule of some sort. He saw Daniel Haryawijaya’s name above another name that have been scratched with something sharp.

They took a left and walked through the corridor. At the end was a wooden door with plant tendrils motifs on it. Rosette stood in front of the door before she opened it. She allowed them to go in.

Aksa was the first one to be greeted by the view of screens displaying CCTV footages of the conservation. A blond white woman was standing in front of a wheeled chair in front of those screens. She turned to them when she noticed their entry.

That woman, Violet Skarsgard, squinted her eyes, before glaring. “You’re not my niblings,” she said, her gaze darting to Rosette behind them.

“We can explain if you allow us to,” Aksa answered with the most respectful tone he could muster. “I’m sorry to have disturbed your time like this, but we have the grave needs to meet your nephew, Daniel. He told us that with the heist that had happened, his schedule has been full with the new shifts.”

Skarsgard frowned before sighing heavily. “Daniel isn’t here. He had been freed from duty by my command. He had no shifts for the next two weeks,” she glanced at the only screen that wasn’t showing CCTV footage, “he checked out of the system already this morning.”

“Seriously?” Aksa heard Ami hiss behind him.

Skarsgard’s brow raised, but she said nothing against the tone. “I can understand that you’ve all here only out of worry, but I urge you to leave at once.”

“Vio?” Another voice scattered their attention. Aksa glanced to his right, only realizing the presence of another woman in the room. “Who are they?”

The lips of the Batak descent man pressed together once he realized who the woman was. A tall, lithe dancer body, bright green eyes and brown hair that she pushed to a messy bun could only belong to the woman that Aksa first saw in the news when she went viral on the internet. This woman had been worshipped by those young female activists on the internet, unofficially regarded as a feminist icon, or _something_.

Aksa was incapable of reading other people’s aura, but Papi had taught him that magic felt like a flow. Sometimes, it felt like a stream that was invisible until it was used, but it could also be an electric current that you could feel. The electric current that radiated from Summer Patria was very strong that if you put a lightbulb near her hand, her magic would blow it to shards.

She was also the boss of Magical Research & Development Department where Aksa’s brother worked. In fact, he was her direct right hand.

“They’re my nephew’s friends,” Violet answered as she rubbed the bridge of her nose. There were heavy dark circles under her eyes that were barely covered by concealer.

“Didn’t you say that your niblings was the one who was here?”

“Well, to put it very kindly, they lied.’

“Then it’s time for them to go, right?”

“Forgive me for interrupting,” Aksa raised his voice a little to earn their attention. The two most influential women in international magic relations turned to him, and he was suddenly hit by the regret of being the subject of their attention. “My brother worked under you. Antariksa Syailendra?”

“Rick?” An edge of amusement returned to her at once. Aksa resisted the urge to snort. Was she serious? _Rick_? It seemed like the kind of nickname earned from being named Richard and not ‘Antariksa’. “You’re Rick’s little brother?”

Angkasa nodded. “Yes, I am. May I ask if his performance in MDR have been satisfactory? I hope that Miss Patria isn’t disappointed by him. My father was really surprised when he got accepted as his school performance had been subpar.”

“Really,” Patria answered flatly.

“Yes, my father had been worried that his faults will tarnish our family name...”

“I’m sure if he’s as your father said he was, I would’ve known already,” Patria’s gaze turned to Violet, quickly losing disinterest with whatever Aksa was saying. “Violet, about the barrier outside—“

“If you are able to convince him to go back to work under my father, that would be preferable,” Aksa continued.

How Patria moved her attention back to him was almost violent. Aksa could feel the entire room’s attention on him, which made him straighten his back at once.

“Look, _kiddo_ ,” Patria started. There was an edge on her voice that tickled Aksa’s emotion. “I could assure you if he’s as disappointing of an asset as your father had made you believe, I would’ve fired him already, and he wouldn’t be begging for him to work there. Your brother has been working under me for a while, and he has been _very_ satisfactory, I doubt he would throw away the time and effort he spent trying to get into MDR to go back working under your father.”

“If Antariksa could get in and become your right hand, I doubt that effort is that hard,” Aksa replied, tilting his head with his words. He grew annoyed with the condescension in her voice.

“You think you could get in?”

Aksa felt a touch of warmth in his palm, but he pushed it away. His complete attention was reserved for Patria only at that moment. “I can,” answered he. Wasn’t that how it was? _He_ was the smarter one of the two of them, his father had always said so. Wasn’t he the one who graduated _summa cum laude_ , and always been complimented by everyone?

“Summer,” Violet warned.

But Patria then faced Aksa directly. Aksa stared back, feeling calm and not even intimidated by the dark rumors that always followed Patria everywhere. Even the sharp green eyes did not scare him in the slightest.

 “MDR only accepted the best employees in the business. Your brother, Antariksa, is a Lead Researcher. Every month he accomplished one main project. These projects have concrete uses and function that applied in the real world,” the woman explained with a tranquil voice. The intensity of magic that flowed from the edges of her body strengthened. “I’ve heard of you from Rick. His little brother who graduated one year ago. What have you done after graduating?”

Aksa almost stepped away from her. There was something stuck in his throat, stealing his own voice away from him.

“What project have you finished? Where is the concrete evidence that you are qualified to be able to be one of our employees? What is your work currently?”

He wanted badly to answer, but he couldn’t; he had been raised to speak what was on his mind. It was right that he had graduated with the best marks in the whole school—something he took pride of, but would never say out loud. He spent a year after graduation to focus on assisting Wiyoko in his project; he had not accomplished anything on his own because of that. Nothing past messy, late night scribbles he hid under his work table. Officially, he hadn’t even _worked_ anywhere yet.

This moment somehow made him recall his father’s offer.

“Hey. That’s enough, old hag.”

Aksa’s anxious mind was dispersed when he heard her voice. Ami’s glare was fierce. She took a step in front of him. He wished it calmed him down—instead it made him feel like three inches tall. Aksa stared at her back and realized how strong she was, how brave. He felt even more anger for himself. His nail dug into his palms as he wished to be as strong as Ami.

But the fact was that he simply _wasn’t_.


	7. Chapter 7

“You have no idea about what Angkasa has done this year. You have no right to condescend him like that.” Ami’s voice is a thunder under the heavy silence around them. She pointed her finger at Patria’s face, who maintained her calm demeanor. “He had just finished a project that could reduce the emission gas from Jakarta’s air. It received an award—“

“A machine is not _magic_ ,” Summer cut her words with her never-changing tone. It made Aksa want to leave the room at once. “ _The Green Device_ has no magic. It isn’t magic related... and it’s Aflah Wiyoko’s project, not his. It deserved the award, of course. Unfortunately, the mass production halted because it was deemed too expensive to be applied to every motor vehicles. So,” if she wasn’t being condescending before, she certainly was this time, “a machine that could only be made by order by upper-middle class people that doesn’t even care about damaging the environment at th first place. So who exactly is benefiting from this machine? This _useless_ machine which, at the end, is only an idealist concept that couldn’t be applied for the general public? _That_ machine?”

Aksa decided it was time to stop his lack of involvement in that conversation. “That’s right.” He didn’t hear any falsehood in the woman’s words. This conflict of interest had been the topic of his late-night discussions with Mr. Wiyoko these past few months. Foreign investors intended to reduce the cost of the production by using cheaper materials, but that could damage the performance of the machine.

“So can _you_ explain to your friend here how the only projects Angkasa finished, a project that’s not magic and not even _his_ own, could qualify him for MDR? Because I’m finding it hard to understand how it matters to this conversation.”

Ami glanced back at him, expecting him to say something, or at least _deny_. But Aksa couldn’t say anything without having something to back him up against. What she said was true. Aksa hated ot let her down—but he _hated_ even more to feel like he was losing and being condescended.

“I don’t think so,” Patria snorted loudly. She glanced back to Violet. “V, our problem remains. Your conference is one hour from now. It’s better if you kick them out.”

Aksa reached for Ami’s elbow, pulling her back. “That’s enough,” he talked in Indonesian, “I appreciate you standing for me, but there’s nothing we can do here. We leave now. Daniel’s not even here. We can try his campus.”

But seeing Aksa’s hopelessness didn’t extinguish the fire in her. It persisted in her eyes. She pushed his hands away. “No,” she retorted. “You’ve been bullied by your brother long enough. Him working in an international magic organization does not make him a better person than you.”

“I have nothing to say to what she said. I am unemployed, you do realize that, right?”

“It doesn’t change the fact that she looked down on your efforts,” Ami replied. While Aksa’s hand remained on his elbow, she struggled against the hold. “Let me go.”

“Not if you’re being stupid. Are you _deaf_ or something? It’s useless. It’s time we leave,” Aksa could hear his voice raising. He’s been raised with an ugly temper, but from his experience, so was _she_.

“Ami, that’s enough. Let’s just leave.” Kama’s voice was barely background noise for the two of them.

“I said _no_.”

No one could see it on her seemingly-skinny body, but Ami was much stronger than him. She managed to push his hand away. When he tried to grab her again, his fists closed on air. Ami had approached the two women. The sound of her Converse against the concrete made the two women turn to her.

She should feel scared, facing women that could intimidate even the highest of men. But she wasn’t. Why wasn’t she scared?

“Miss Patria,” she started. “I don’t care about your status as the head of MDR. I didn’t know the position came with the ability to look down on people.”

Violet was the first one to respond. She seemed worried more than irritated. “Ami, if you don’t mind, we have more pressing matters.” Aksa was surprised to see that Violet seemed to remember her name—or at least understand what they were talking about enough to pick up her name.

However, Aksa could see from the way Patria’s jaw tightened that something has pricked her attention. The brown-haired woman dismissed Violet with a wave of her hand. “No, I’m interested,” she replied quickly before Violet could protest. “Miss, I don’t need to look down on your friend. I only evaluated the social contribution of that machine. And you, here, I’m guessing, are trying to say that my evaluation is false?”

“Yeah,” Ami answered.

“Then who is right? You?”

“Maybe.”

“And who are _you_? What’s your social contribution?”

“I’m a part of an organization that take care of the exorcism of spirits and demons in Java.”

“That’s easy. Only in Java?”

“I don’t think that the importance of this kind of job will be comprehended by a foreigner like you.” Ami shrugged. “Where are you from again? England? Or was it Russia? That kind of social work would not be comprehended by a person with such connection with the underworld like you—a _bule_ like you have no idea what to do with ethnic spirits.”

From where he was standing, seven feet away, Aksa could swear he saw the edge of Summer’s lips twitch. Kama grabbed him by the shoulder, hissing: “Stop Ami right now before we all get _hexed_.”

“Hexed?” Aksa pulled away against the touch. “Don’t overreact.”

“You have no idea about Summer Patria, have you?” Kama emphasized by punching Aksa on the shoulder.

Aksa squinted at him, stroking his shoulder (Kama should remind himself that he had a martial art skill on his belt). He deemed it impossible that Summer would dare to hex anyone in public, in front of witnesses that could sue her for assault. However, as Summer pulled out a bright green stone from the long staff she was holding, Aksa felt something fell to the bottom of his stomach. She grabbed Ami’s hand and pressed the stone against it, a spell spilling out of her mouth.

Around them, the previously warm temperature of the room dropped dramatically. Aksa stepped back as his breath turned into white in front of him. Meanwhile, Violet Skarsgard pressed two of her fingers against her ear and said something, although he couldn’t hear anything in the air; only the loud roaring of the wind that felt like nothing on his skin.

The lamp above them flickered off before it turned bright, seemingly at once. Ami pulled away harshly from Summer, with much force that the taller woman stepped back.

The wind has quietened. Aksa didn’t need to know anything about hexes to know that what just happened wasn’t good.

“What you did—“ Ami started, her voice loud against the eerie silence of the room.

“What? Is it not supposed to be done by someone who doesn’t know anything about ethnic spirits in Indonesia?” Summer answered. Her voice was colder than the temperature that had not gone back to normal. “It will not be difficult for you to exorcise a spirit that’s previously under someone who understands _nothing_.”

Aksa felt his feet move before his brain. He pulled Ami’s hand to him. A tattoo had emerged on her skin: a black plant snare that circled her wrist. The skin around the tattoo had lost its warmth that even the visible vein had turned darker.

“But if you find it difficult, of course, you can ask for help. I assume that you know where MDR is,” Summer continued flatly. He turned to Violet as the door blasted open.

Aksa turned to go face to face with a young man with cracked goggles hanging around his neck. He wore casual clothes under the familiar navy of MCCS bomber jacket. Daniel Haryawijaya was breathing heavily. His sweat was dripping on his forehead.

“Daniel,” Violet said. She sounded like she was talking to her underling rather than her closest nephew. “I’m sure you’ll be more than happy to bring your friends outside. I would love to escort all of you out, but I have a more pressing matter with Miss Patria.”

“Wait,” Aksa muttered. His voice was so faint that he had to repeat it. “ _Wait_. You have to release her from this hex. This is a _crime_ —“

“Should I remind all of you that you all are also violating the law?” Summer replied without so much as turning to them.

Daniel frowned sharply at both of them before his hand circled tightly around Aksa’s arm. He dragged him out, with Aksa still holding onto Ami. Something that Aksa did not understand feel heavy against his throat, but it was a familiar feeling whenever Daniel touched him.

He didn’t realize that Kama had walked out ahead of them. He was leaning against the wall near the stairs, a dark expression on his face—but he said nothing, only watched as the door closed behind them.

Daniel pushed Aksa’s arm, but Aksa known him enough to plant his feet; the push was met by a resistance, but Aksa still stumbled backwards, just a little. His gaze fell on the visible muscle on Daniel’s arms, subtle and foreign.

“What the fuck were you even thinking?” Daniel snapped loudly. Ami flinched upon hearing it, sending rage up Aksa’s throat. He met Daniel’s gaze fiercely, hoping that his stare would be enough to make his best friend shut his mouth. But if it wasn’t Daniel if he does that. Instead, their silence only served to make him raise his voice. “You’re all fucking _insane_. I told all of you not to come. This conservation had just experienced theft, you’re all fucking lucky that my aunt is not suing for fraud!”

“Dan,” Aksa warned, because Daniel was not anything but _dense_ when his emotions get the better of him.

“Mi, I know this is your fucking idea, because it’s simply impossible for the others to be this idiotic,” Daniel ignored Aksa’s warning and pointed at Ami with his finger. Aksa opened his mouth to intervene, but the finger simply moved to his direction. “Not that you’re not fucking _stupid_. You already know that this is a stupid idea, and you go along with it. Ami would not be here without your help. Didn’t you say you want to take care of her but simply to prevent her from doing this kind of stupid shit is beyond you—“

“What I do is not up to him,” Ami’s silence turned into a snarl. The two men’s gaze was focused on her at once. “Or _YOU_.” Ami pushed harshly at Daniel’s body with both of her hands.

Daniel stumbled backwards, his back hitting the wall; he straightened, at once, meeting her rage. “Ami—“

“When are you going to appreciate my efforts? Before you went, you promised me that you’ll go home.”

“Don’t be a fucking kid, Mi. You know why I haven’t gone back. I’m _busy_.”

“Five times. Five fucking times, you said that you’ll go back. You missed my birthday? Fine. I don’t mind that you didn’t give me any present, you never did, but to—just to fucking call? You called two days later. Not an hour late. Not even a day. _Two_ days. Fuck you.”

“I’ve apologized about that for many times, what else do you want? I don’t understand why you keep bringing it up. You know from the start that I’m working while going to college. You’re my best friend, you said you will _understand_.”

“I said that because the old you would be a man of your word. That’s a quality that you no longer have,” Ami pried Aksa’s hand off her shoulder. “I thought you would _notice_ how much we missed you, Dan, but what do we even get? You didn’t even have the grace to call us to deliver the news. You _texted_. Is this what our so-called life-long best friendship _worth_? A fucking text?”

“You will not listen to me even if I call,” Daniel replied, “so I just didn’t bother _trying_.”

Aksa that had been in the front line of the fight could see how _close_ Ami was to exploding. He wanted to intervene, but he also knew that this argument was one of those things that they had to go through without his intervention. But even if he wanted to— _how could he_? Ami and Daniel had not even given him a glance the entire time.

“You have two weeks off,” Ami finally said.

Daniel seemed surprised; blood had drained from his face. “ _What_?”

“You said that something came up with MCCS, but you _got two weeks off_. Does that sound busy to you?”

Daniel groaned loudly. “You don’t _understand_.”

“Jesus, you’re such a fucking _asshole_. Fuck trying to understand. Get the fuck out of my face.”

Without any further word, the Javanese girl walked ahead of them down the stairs. When his gaze followed, Aksa only noticed the presence of Violet’s redheaded assistance on the other end of the corridor; Rosette followed Ami closely behind. Kama sighed loudly before following, disappearing with them on the end of the stairs, leaving Aksa alone with Daniel.

Daniel rubbed the bridge of his nose, suddenly looking younger than Aksa remembered.

“Where did you go?” Aksa asked calmly.

“None of your fucking business,” Daniel replied.

The words had not landed correctly. Aksa had always been a creature of rage—but he had learned that dealing with Daniel that way was pointless. _Guiltripping_ seemed to be more efficient. So instead, he said, “Ami was hexed by Summer Patria before you came. You shouldn’t have talked like that to her. She might be strong, but you leaving took a toll.”

Daniel shook his head. Instead of responding to the words, he only said: “Why didn’t you prohibit her from doing stupid shit?”

“Didn’t you hear what she said?”

“If you told her to do something, she’ll listen.”

“She doesn’t listen to me, she listens to her childhood friend.”

“But you’re her _ex_.”

Aksa simply frowned at him. “What the fuck does that have to do with _anything_?”

Daniel stared at him for a moment before saying, “You still could drag her somewhere else.”

“Dani,” Aksa started, feeling the familiar pressure of headache coming, “do you think she’s the only one that wanted to meet you?”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“You heard me. Ami isn’t the only one who wants to meet you.”

“Yeah, who else?”

“You’re a fucking idiot, Daniel Haryawijaya,” Aksa snorted and decided to walk away, leaving his friend alone in the corridor. He could hear Daniel follow him. He simply made his stride quicker. He had better things to think about rather than an oblivious man who could not tell what was happening.


End file.
